1) General taxes and cross-subsides of a state are irrelevant is laws and allowances are different. We've seen reports before of how much it costs, the red tape involved, and how long it takes in the US to get a single tower in Dallas/Houston v SF/NYC so you can't make a blanket statement for an entire nation without knowing the specifics of the law.

2) Again, I've seen in Eastern Europe where cellular coverage was better than similar sized cities in the US a decade ago. Why would a much poorer, less-technologically advance nation have small cities that are superior to a US cities? My feeling is because prior to the mobile revolution they had a poor communications infrastructure so cell towers allowed them to move quickly to shore up their deficiencies. Would this sort of thing then get funded by the government? We've seen it before.

3) I never said we were good. As far my conversion here is concerned that was never in the mix until now.

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Great to see some price competition. I bought an unlocked iPhone 5S and then made Wal-Mart's Straighttalk plan work on it. It's a clumsy solution as you have to use a special gadget to stamp a Micro sim into a nano sim to fit the iPhone 5S.

But it's unlimited everything for $45 and rides on AT&T. After 2.5 GB in any month, the speed can be throttled down.

1) General taxes and cross-subsides of a state are irrelevant is laws and allowances are different. We've seen reports before of how much it costs, the red tape involved, and how long it takes in the US to get a single tower in Dallas/Houston v SF/NYC so you can't make a blanket statement for an entire nation without knowing the specifics of the law.

2) Again, I've seen in Eastern Europe where cellular coverage was better than similar sized cities in the US a decade ago. Why would a much poorer, less-technologically advance nation have small cities that are superior to a US cities? My feeling is because prior to the mobile revolution they had a poor communications infrastructure so cell towers allowed them to move quickly to shore up their deficiencies. Would this sort of thing then get funded by the government? We've seen it before.

3) I never said we were good. As far my conversion here is concerned that was never in the mix until now.

I agree with your hypothesis (2). Cell phone technology now provides a much cheaper route to voice and data in less developed countries than investing in landline infrastructure.

....so you can't make a blanket statement for an entire nation without knowing the specifics of the law.

I was not making a blanket statement for an entire nation. I was specifically talking about high-population corridors such as Boston-DC and LA-SF (please take another look at my original post).

The point I was making -- apparently, not very successfully -- was somewhat different. I was not referring to the cost at all, but rather that the speed and quality of what we get even in densely populated places in the US is poor compared to some of the other countries out there.

I agree with your hypothesis (2). Cell phone technology now provides a much cheaper route to voice and data in less developed countries than investing in landline infrastructure.

You're forgetting of course that cell sites work off a landline infrastructure.

No I'm not forgetting that. Firstly, cell towers can use microwave for backhaul, but even with the trend towards more efficient optical links, it is still much cheaper to run optical fibers to a limited number of cell towers than to run fiber or cable to every property.

The point was made above that some US locales have too few cellular towers. (Probably not New Jersey, which is littered with the eyesores, even including the faux-tree towers.) But virtually every US town is populated by a vast number of utility poles--heck, we've deforested our mountains and re-forested our towns with their embalmed trunks. It is insane that these poles, which already carry both power and communication wiring, are not being utilized as mini-cell towers. They're already an eyesore, and adding another antenna on top would not make it much worse.

Why would the government break up a monopoly that they awarded in the first place? What's a reasonable level? Everyone is applauding T-Mobile but they just got the worst ratings. It's laughable that you don't want your phone manufacturer to get into a race to the bottom but you want your carrier to do just that.

So-called "ratings" of mobile service though will vary considerably by location, and which "ratings" are you referring to? It's well documented that T-Mobile has gaps in its rural network, but if you live in a metro area, the service is generally fine. And even though they're still catching up with filling out their LTE network, the performance from their more widely deployed HSPA+ network is fast enough for most smartphone uses (my neighborhood, which is out of T-Mobile's current LTE range, averages 6 Mbps download and 2.5 Mbps upload speed).

What you refer to as a "race to the bottom" with mobile carriers, I refer to as choice and transparency and competition. As nice as smartphones are, I didn't even consider purchasing one until the service plans became more "reasonable" -- not only with the pricing, but with the service terms as well. I did not want a contract and I wanted to stay in the iOS ecosystem (already own an iPod touch and a cellular-enabled iPad), so I stayed on the sidelines so long as service plans required a contract or a high-priced plan to use an iPhone.

Consumers applaud T-Mobile because they expanded real choice in the market. Once T-Mobile expanded their prepaid and contract-free options, they addressed something that a large number of consumers clearly wanted. The network coverage and maximum data speed are not high priorities for me. So, I don't care to pay the higher base plan rates, puny data allotments, and overage charges associated with those carriers such as Verizon that have broader coverage. This is a totally separate issue from the "race to the bottom" occurring with smartphones (not made by Apple). I'm fine with paying more to get more. I just happened to see more value in a premium smartphone than premium cell service.

From what I've read that US leads in LTE deployment. In concentrated areas like NYC, Chicago, SF and Dallas that have large deployment, they have poor performance because the infrastructure can't handle the load. Apparently, the CEO of Verizon recently said that Verizon is at capacity in these areas -- and cannot add additional bandwidth.

From what I've read that US leads in LTE deployment. In concentrated areas like NYC, Chicago, SF and Dallas that have large deployment, they have poor performance because the infrastructure can't handle the load. Apparently, the CEO of Verizon recently said that Verizon is at capacity in these areas -- and cannot add additional bandwidth.

How to define deployment? The article I posted starts off by showing nations and carriers with the most coverage, but I would imagine the size and spreadoutedness of the US would mean it probably has deployed a lot more LTE towers than any other nation.

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From what I've read that US leads in LTE deployment. In concentrated areas like NYC, Chicago, SF and Dallas that have large deployment, they have poor performance because the infrastructure can't handle the load. Apparently, the CEO of Verizon recently said that Verizon is at capacity in these areas -- and cannot add additional bandwidth.

VZW is now using AWS for performance improvements.

"Few things are harder to put up with than the annoyance of a good example" Mark Twain"Just because something is deemed the law doesn't make it just" - SolipsismX

From what I've read that US leads in LTE deployment. In concentrated areas like NYC, Chicago, SF and Dallas that have large deployment, they have poor performance because the infrastructure can't handle the load. Apparently, the CEO of Verizon recently said that Verizon is at capacity in these areas -- and cannot add additional bandwidth.

VZW is now using AWS for performance improvements.

I wonder how much time that will buy Verizon .... How long before they saturate the AWS spectrum in dense usage areas?

And, the capability is only available on some recent (2013 & later) LTE phones.

"Swift generally gets you to the right way much quicker." - auxio -

"The perfect [birth]day -- A little playtime, a good poop, and a long nap." - Tomato Greeting Cards -

I live in a metro area, and, ironically, two blocks from a T-Mobile store. The T-Mobile coverage here is not good, according to those I know who have T-Mobile. ATT, otoh, is awesome. I've considered switching in the past, since ATT costs more. But it isn't worth it.

There are definitely places, though, where there are fewer trees than people. Heck, I lived in one of those places for a year: Tempe, AZ. There were probably more people in my dorm* than there were trees in all of Tempe.

* = my dorm had 15 floors, btw.

Are you including palm trees as trees or grass because I recall there are plenty at Palm Walk alone. The internet says 111.

Sweet Jesus, is nothing sacred:

"Swift generally gets you to the right way much quicker." - auxio -

"The perfect [birth]day -- A little playtime, a good poop, and a long nap." - Tomato Greeting Cards -

I love when they do that because it's so visually appalling. That said, that is the nicest looking fauxliage (I may have just coined that*) I've seen for cell phone towers. The palm and conifer fauzliage trees are easily found when you know what to look for.

* Nope! Not even close, but I will say all the uses I noticed seem to refer to a band name.

This bot has been removed from circulation due to a malfunctioning morality chip.

I wonder how much time that will buy Verizon .... How long before they saturate the AWS spectrum in dense usage areas?

And, the capability is only available on some recent (2013 & later) LTE phones.

Barring some new tech I wouldn't be surprised if they take a page out of AT&T's play book, and offer free wifi in the areas where usage is highest.

Wouldn't that be just another delaying tactic? As I understand it WiFi networks are subject to similar capacity, interference and saturation problems as cell radios.

We live in the suburbs and here's the WiFi bands I detect on my Mac:

As you can see, there are at least * 20 WiFi routers within range -- creating interference and degrading each others performance. Note that many have switched to the 5 GHz band to avoid interference on the 2.5 GHz band.

* The number differs depending on time of day and day of week.

Here are some charts from a video I posted -- AFAICT the same problems will/are affecting WiFi:

"Swift generally gets you to the right way much quicker." - auxio -

"The perfect [birth]day -- A little playtime, a good poop, and a long nap." - Tomato Greeting Cards -

I love when they do that because it's so visually appalling. That said, that is the nicest looking fauxliage (I may have just coined that*) I've seen for cell phone towers. The palm and conifer fauzliage trees are easily found when you know what to look for.

* Nope! Not even close, but I will say all the uses I noticed seem to refer to a band name.

I love the term fauxliage -- it fits here, perfectly!

I also ran across this bit of wisdom while surfing for fauxliage:

“A man who carries a cat by the tail learns something he can learn in no other way"
-Mark Twain.

The point was made above that some US locales have too few cellular towers. (Probably not New Jersey, which is littered with the eyesores, even including the faux-tree towers.) But virtually every US town is populated by a vast number of utility poles--heck, we've deforested our mountains and re-forested our towns with their embalmed trunks. It is insane that these poles, which already carry both power and communication wiring, are not being utilized as mini-cell towers. They're already an eyesore, and adding another antenna on top would not make it much worse.

I don't know how they got away with it, but In some areas Verizon installed their FiOS fiber optic cables from pole to pole is big plastic pipes. The wires were bad enough. The service is still very expensive as they didn't pass the savings to their customers.

In the wealthy hill communities in the Los Angeles area from Hollywood, to Beverly Hills, Bel-Air, Brentwood, Pacific Palisades and Malibu there is very little or no cellular service and it's 2014.

As a frequent traveller to Europe, I've never seen those speeds in Italy, UK, and Germany. From my experience, the speeds here in the U.S. are much faster compared to every European country I've been in. A lot of countries in Europe don't even have an LTE network yet. Places like the UK have just recently started adding LTE networks across the country.

I don't know how they got away with it, but In some areas Verizon installed their FiOS fiber optic cables from pole to pole is big plastic pipes. The wires were bad enough. The service is still very expensive as they didn't pass the savings to their customers.

In the wealthy hill communities in the Los Angeles area from Hollywood, to Beverly Hills, Bel-Air, Brentwood, Pacific Palisades and Malibu there is very little or no cellular service and it's 2014.

Verizon lost big on FiOS. They've already given up the plans they had for expanding the service into other regions. Any future improvements entail filling in network gaps for the areas where they've already installed FiOS service, and milking their existing infrastructure for whatever revenue they can squeeze from it.

Wealthy areas are also the likeliest to mount stiff opposition to additional cell towers. In Palo Alto, AT&T (and others) has had spotty cell coverage for years. They proposed installing a cell site hidden inside of a church building clock tower, and nearby residents went ballistic, threatening lawsuits, and pressuring the City Council not to approve them. Then AT&T decided to go with a distributed system of multiple cell antennas mounted on utility poles. Opposition shot that proposal down as well. Another system of dispersed antennas wound up finally getting City Council approval, but this took a four-year process and cell coverage is still not great.